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Wen weighs in with Hamlet and history in his armoury

June 28 2011, 1:01am, The Times

Shakespeare, wherefore art thou when we need you? Or, shall I say, Wen-for art thou? For the Chinese Premier taught us all a lesson in political theatre yesterday at his press conference with David Cameron. By the end, he had upstaged Dave — and us.

These events are as tightly controlled as possible. We had all gathered in the Locarno Room at the Foreign Office. Dave announced a squillion-pound trade deal and said the UK and China had opened a “people-to-people dialogue”. What did it mean? Mr Wen, below, said, via the simultaneous translator, that it was a “high-level people-to-people dialogue”. Also, he said, when it came to human rights, there should be no “finger pointing”.